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You’ll Get Through This: Hope and Help for Your Turbulent Times
You’ll Get Through This: Hope and Help for Your Turbulent Times
by Max Lucado
I have always been fascinated by the Biblical story of Joseph, from the coat of many colors to saving Egypt and his people from famine. The story includes pride and arrogance, bad parenting, attempted fratricide, slavery, temptations, false accusations, jail, forgotten promises, a rise to power, revenge, and forgiveness. Joseph’s life was a roller coaster ride. There had to be a lot of times when Joseph could have questioned God, “Why me?”
Max Lucado uses Joseph’s story to speak to those who are hurting, who find themselves in a pit of despair. In You’ll Get Through This, Lucado offers the hope found in the Bible that what was intended for evil can be used by God for good. Lucado is the ultimate storyteller, and he brings in stories of people he knows and those he has met to demonstrate his points. With chapters like “Stupid Won’t Fix Stupid” and “Is God Good When Life Isn’t?”, Lucado’s book is Biblical, practical, and inspirational. I read it at the pace of a chapter a day with more than a few sneak peeks ahead, and I plan on rereading it. There is so much help and understanding rooted in its pages for both men and women who are facing life’s challenges.
Rating: 5/5
Category: Christian, Nonfiction, Self-Help
Notes: To aid readers who want to use You’ll Get Through This for book or Bible study, there are added “Questions for Reflection” at the end of the book to accompany each chapter.
Publication: September 10, 2013—Thomas Nelson
Memorable Lines:
You’ll get through this.
It won’t be painless.
It won’t be quick.
But God will use this mess for good.
Don’t be foolish or naive.
But don’t despair either.
With God’s help, you’ll get through this.
Gratitude gets us through the hard stuff. To reflect on your blessings is to rehearse God’s accomplishments. To rehearse God’s accomplishments is to discover his heart. To discover his heart is to discover not just good gifts but the Good Giver. Gratitude always leaves us looking at God and away from dread. It does to anxiety what the morning sun does to valley mist. It burns it up.
God is plotting for our good. In all the setbacks and slip-ups, he is ordaining the best for our future. Every event of our days is designed to draw us toward our God and our destiny.
The Forgiving Jar–the power of forgiveness
The Forgiving Jar
by Wanda E. Brunstetter
Mysterious prayer jars filled with Bible verses and notes of faith are an inspiration to two young ladies whose paths cross when one, in an act of desperation, assumes the identity of the other. Michelle, who pretends to be Sara, finds a hope jar in the barn of the Amish couple she is deceiving. Sara, their true granddaughter, finds a forgiving jar in the basement of their house. Regardless of who hid the treasure filled canning jars, God uses the messages in the jars to give hope, inspire forgiveness, and lead the women into a relationship with Him.
Having enjoyed The Hope Jar, I looked forward to continuing the tale in The Forgiving Jar and was not disappointed. Unanswered questions in the first book were mostly answered in the second, and closure was brought to all of the relationship issues. The characters in the first book continue into the second like meeting up again with old friends. I especially like the loving and patient spirit of Sara’s Amish grandparents, Will and Mary Ruth Lapp, who, according to Amish tradition, do not evangelize but “tried by their actions and deeds to be an example of what it meant to be a Christian.” The characters are realistically portrayed as they struggle to overcome old, deep-seated hurts through forgiveness which is not depicted lightly as an easy thing to do.
I recommend The Hope Jar and The Forgiving Jar as a pair. Readers will smile, root for the characters at various times in the story, be saddened over events past and present, and be happy that, as promised, God works out even the bad in their pasts for good.
I would like to extend my thanks to netgalley.com and to Barbour Publishing (Shiloh Run Press) for giving me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.
Rating: 4/5
Category: General Fiction (Adult), Christian
Notes: 1. The Prayer Jars #2. I strongly recommend reading The Hope Jar first.
2. There are recipes and discussion questions at the end of the book.
Publication: February 1, 2019—Barbour Publishing (Shiloh Run Press)
Memorable Lines:
Michelle took a deep breath, enjoying the scents of the season. The fragrance of dried leaves still lingered from autumn, and the tang of wood smoke drifting out of chimneys from nearby homes permeated the air.
“The problem with guilt is until we let go, our thoughts can be consumed with it—sometimes to the point of it making us sick or affecting our relationships with others.”
She wished she could shut the door on her memories as easily as she closed the door on the winter’s cold.
